The American Era: Construction Period
The American Era: Construction Period
1904
Construction begins on the Panama Canal. President Roosevelt appoints John Findley Wallace, First Chief Engineer. Wallace finds conditions in Panama in chaos:
● Millions of dollars of French equipment lay in huge scrap heaps
● Rusted locomotives overgrown with vines
● Dredging machines toppled or sunk
● Rails and pipes scattered
● Most of the French buildings abandoned and in disrepair
● Poor infrastructure and sanitary conditions
Nevertheless Wallace starts work immediately at Culebra Cut, using what French equipment is salvageable.
Wallace is used to working under “civilized” conditions and this is anything but civilized. There is little in the way of housing for the workers, no public buildings, few roads and no sewage system. People are sick and dying from malaria and yellow fever. Terrified for his own health, Wallace resigns after only a year at the helm.
1905
Roosevelt replaces Wallace with John F. Stevens, as Chief Engineer. Stevens is one of the most seasoned railroad builders in the United States. A decisive, strong leader, Stevens recognizes that before work can start on the canal, workers will need adequate housing, water and sewers, safety and recreation. Improved living conditions offers the workers incentive to see the project through to the end.
On August 1, he orders all work at Culebra Cut stopped. In one year, 1,250 homes, hospitals, administration buildings, and recreation centers are built. 1,200 buildings that had belonged to the French are rebuilt. He further encourages women and families to come to the Canal.
Col. William Crawford Gorgas becomes Chief Sanitary Engineer. Probably one of Stevens’s best decisions is to give Dr. Gorgas whatever men and supplies he needs. His task is to eradicate yellow fever. Dr. Gorgas learned that yellow fever is transmitted from the bite of a mosquito and that mosquitoes breed in water. He sets about to clean up the Canal Zone by fighting mosquitoes. Because of the efforts, yellow fever is eradicated in one year.
1906
President Theodore Roosevelt leaves Washington, D.C., for a 17 day trip to Panama and Puerto Rico, becoming the first president to make an official visit outside of the U.S.
1907
George Washington Goethals, US Major General and engineer, is appointed to succeed Stevens as Chief Engineer. He sees the Canal through to completion and becomes the first governor of the Canal Zone.
1907
Lt. Col. David DuBose Gaillard is appointed engineer in charge of the Central Divison, responsible for a 31 mile section from the upper locks at Pedro Miguel to the Gatun Dam. He continues on from where the French had left off, “breaking the back of the isthmus” and cuts a canal through the continental divide at Culebra Cut which is later renamed in his honor.
1909
Work begins on canal locks. The locks tower 80 feet high and are 100 feet long. The chamber floors are 13 feet deep. The locks are made of poured concrete. Gigantic forms are built into which the concrete is poured. Big square buckets, nearly 6 tons each, are swung through the air above the locks, dropped into position, and dumped, all by the way of a spectacular cableway.
1912
Work is completed on the Gatun Dam to create the Panama Canal’s main water supply. The Gatun Dam on the Chagres River are built using tons of spoil from Culebra Cut. Tons of concrete is poured to complete the spillway.
1913
Work on the locks completed.
Two steam shovels meet nose to nose in the bottom of Culebra Cut on May 10. President Woodrow Wilson pushes a button in Washington, D.C., to send a signal through the telegraph to blow up the center of the dike, finally mingling Atlantic with Pacific waters.
1914
Panama Canal opened to traffic on August 15 when SS Ancon completes the first transit.
The Panama Canal, a 52 mile long waterway, is completed at a cost of $352 million, remarkably under budget and under schedule.
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